A sack of bricks, a broad-brimmed hat and two dumb bells by Dr.Iain Corness

As I walked down the road to my car the other day, there was this apparition walking towards me. It was wearing a rucksack filled with bricks, a broad-brimmed hat and dumb bells in each hand. He was walking to work, a distance of around 10 km by my estimation, give or take a wheeze or two.

Now, what was the reason for this rather bizarre behavior? Hands up all those who said “Trying to get fit”. Correct. Go and buy yourselves a chocolate ice cream.

Now I am not decrying the actions of this particular person in trying to get fit (and he will achieve this with his daily routine) however, it makes me sad to see that some of us have to end up with drastic measures to counteract the damage to one’s personal health on the way!

So what is the answer? The answer is to not let yourself get too much out of shape on the way. The vast majority of us arrive at our 21st birthday in reasonable shape, but it does go downhill from there.

The best monitors of your general condition (and shape) are your weight and blood pressure. Both are easy to check, and can be done at home. Bathroom scales will show the weight tendencies and the BP often reflects the weight as well, and home BP monitors are cheap these days.

So, what do you do if the weight starts creeping up? Well, for myself, if I put on two kg, then I diet for a week or two until the weight has gone down again. Skip lunches for a few days seems to be the trick for me. It can be for you too, but you do have to be strict with yourself and not let the physical condition get too disastrous! Or the answer becomes a sack of bricks, a broad-brimmed hat and two dumb bells!

Finally, as they write in books – Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is purely coincidental. But then again ;-))